6.27 - Kuzan''s Scheme

Salire’s dedication to alchemy was admirable. Theo couldn’t get his mind to work fast enough to process what had just happened. Meeting the system itself was weird, giving him a sensation he couldn’t place lingered in the back of his mind. Whoever Void was, he had escaped into the wider world. He shook those thoughts loose for now, more eager to figure out how his new alchemy step worked. They brought their gear behind the Newt and Demon, ready to test.

“This makes sense to me.” Salire attached a mixing artifice onto a small-scale still. She attached the tubes, ready to fill the mixing chamber. “Dilutions plus mana plus essences.”

It was logical, as long as a person kept magic in mind. Taking a third tier essence and infusing it with a complimentary dilution with mana would infuse the resulting essence. Instead of striving to remove the impurities, it would double-down on the good stuff. They weren’t removing those bad parts, but making them less within the mixture. That’s what Theo thought, anyway.

“Let’s go,” Theo said, pressing his hand against the mana infusion chamber. “Are the stills up to heat?”

“Of course. Those little guys heat in a few seconds.”

There was nothing left to do but try. Theo kept his theory to himself until the mana fused perfectly with the dilution, then mixed with the third tier essence in the mixing chamber. Both Salire and Theo hid behind a tree as the mixture combined. Because it should have exploded. But it didn’t. The alchemist removed himself from cover and approached, hooking the condenser up to the artifice and placing a flask under it. Essence dripped out, collecting in the glass flask.

“Did we do something different?” Salire asked, still hiding behind the tree.

“The equipment might have helped, but that wasn’t the only thing.” Theo knelt down, looking at the faintly pink liquid as it dripped into the flask. “This is the software update.”

“The what?”

“I’m almost certain the system didn’t know what to do for the fourth tier. Pretty sure we just invented it.”

Salire approached the flask with caution, her head turned to one side in case the mixture exploded. “How the hell does that work?”

“Drogramath wasn’t performing his own form of alchemy when he was down here. Before he became an ascendant, he was doing the normal kind of alchemy. If I had to guess, he ascended close to Level 100 and built his power from there. Only after he ascended did he make his alchemy cores, and his people never got to fourth tier alchemy.”

“Seems like an incomplete theory,” Salire said, a doubtful look washing over her face.

“Agreed.”

Theo didn’t have all the answers. But he had some fourth tier essence in a flask. One thing he noticed from the experiment was the quantity of essence he got from the reaction. It was less than the standard reaction would produce, but he could feel the magical potency of the liquid even without touching it. He examined the mixture.

[Refined Bound Stabilized Healing Essence]

[Essence] [Refined Essence] [Bound Essence] [Stabilized Essence]

Uncommon

Created by: Theo Spencer

Grade: Poor Quality

Purity: 95%

0.25 units (liquid)

Concentrated, refined, bound, stabilized essence of healing. Used to create healing potions.

The quality sucked, but there was time for improvements later. For now, he was happy to have any amount of the new essence. This was a proof of concept, after all. What they needed now was to industrialize the process as much as they could. While the lab didn’t produce truly industrial quantities of their potions, their output exceeded that of most labs in the world. That was Theo’s thought, anyway. He had yet to explore anything other than what he had created.

Theo tilted his head to the side, feeling something emanating in the distance. “What was that?”

Salire shrugged. “Did you hear something?”

“Felt something. Someone parting the veil. Maybe Fenian?”

Another shrug from the apprentice alchemist. “He said he was leaving to see the elves.”

Theo hummed, looking back at their small-scale experiment. “Time to bother Throk some more.”

The veil parted the way it always had for Fenian. His enchanted karatan surged forward, clopping over the stones in Broken Tusk that gave way to the smooth ride of the Bridge. He let out a sigh of relief, feeling the energies of Uz’Xulven wash over him like a comforting wave. The Bridge had changed little since the last time he visited it. Those thoroughfares leading from one realm to the other forked off in every direction, revealed to a champion of the Queen of the Bridge of Shadows. He cleared his throat as a familiar weight settled in next to him.

“Those instructions allowed the mortals to ascend and play at divinity. While they changed the titles of positions, they didn’t gain the power of a true god.”

Swallowing hard, Fenian read between the creature’s words. “That’s frightening.”

“Mortal, Throne, Ascendant, God, Creator.” The Watcher nodded to himself, closing his beady eyes and sucking in a lungful of air. “I wonder if you’ve put things together yet. Not likely.”

“Twelve gods, two systems, five thrones.” The Watcher allowed the words to hang in the air, sensing when Fenian picked up on the error. Something of a smile graced the creature’s eyes, but not his beaked face. “Heaven, Realm, Mortality, Dimensionality, and... What’s the best word? Null.”

Perhaps that revelation was a distraction. There could have been one-thousand thrones and Fenian wouldn’t care. His mind focused on the implications of the Watcher’s previous statement. The gods weren’t gods. They were ascendant beings that had seized power and created a realm. After the Second War of Ascendancy, they convinced the system to change their title. From Ascendant to God. Twelve gods. Not ten-thousand. The elf turned his eyes skyward, looking at the green clouds that pooled to block the stars.

He could feel it, though it was faint. Like a tug at his navel after a steep drop. As though his connection with the Bridge was in freefall.

“Welcome to a new era.” The Watcher produced something like a laugh. “Welcome to the War in Heaven.”

Fenian felt the being leave, but didn’t respond. He closed his eyes, focusing on his connection with Uz’Xulven. As her champion, he felt the breach. The unsanctioned declaration of war that rippled throughout the heavens. Theo had really screwed this one up. But his hammer heart calmed after a few breaths. This wasn’t what he had in mind, but it achieved the same end. Didn’t it?

“What better to kill ascendants than gods?” Fenian asked himself, chuckling as he scooped something from the water. He sucked it into his inventory, ascending the bowl of the crater. “Come, Galflower. We have something else to grab before we go. Something an emperor will want desperately.”

Emperor Kuzan drummed his fingers on the arm of his throne. His peerless eyes scanned not only the area of his immediate court, but places for miles around. Balkor’s mindless undead were attacking his eastern shores, and he couldn’t have been more bored. He took a steady breath, nodding to his steward.

“Off to Droth Ker Taral Set, my lord?” he asked.

“Something changed,” Kuzan said, standing and rolling his shoulders. His joints cracked with satisfying pops as he reached out to his private realm. “I’ll only be gone a moment.”

The emperor of Tarantham passed through the veil, slipping unseen to his hidden High Elderling Realm. His boots crunched leaves underfoot as he made his way to the forest’s edge. Screens appeared hovering in the air, displaying scenes from the mortal plane and the heavens alike. Four of the five interlopers had made their moves, but something was wrong with the fifth. One screen focused on Fenian’s carriage, which was inbound to Tarantham.

“What do you have there?” Kuzan asked, squinting as though he could see into the elf’s inventory. It would have worked if he was here, but with the remote-viewing ability it did nothing.

“Aren’t you going to join them?”

The twinkling voice that came from behind him felt like daggers dragged over his flesh. He didn’t turn to greet the crystalline entity. The emperor didn’t care for her musings last time, and he wouldn’t suffer them this time.

“I’m staying out of it.”

“You’ll die.”

Kuzan grit his teeth, still refusing to turn. He moved his screens around, checking on his agents and investments. He doubted she was right. There was enough time to plan this time, and his mind wasn’t addled by the old version of this system. Although she was likely right, he didn’t care. The cost to form this realm was too great, and he wouldn’t let anyone have it.

“Have you come to mock me?” Kuzan asked.

“Just a warning is all. Once the shards are in place, you won’t have a choice. You’ll need to ascend.”

Kuzan flipped through more screens, scanning the endless ascendant realms. “Has Eral Dum formed yet?”

“None have. The lower realms must be destroyed first.”

Kuzan always knew it would happen fast, but this was bad. He looked over his realm, allowing himself to smile at what he had worked so hard for. Once Fire, Shadow, Twin, Shifting, and Earth formed it would only be a matter of time. Perhaps he could convince a few of them to take mortal forms again, but that would be hard. But once the anchors were in place, that was possible. He only hoped there was something of an elf left in his ancestors. For their sakes, and the sake of his future children.

“This is what it comes to.” Kuzan let out a sigh. “We go through the same thing as last time. Is he in the queue?”

“Yes, but he was given extra protections. He will not come until conditions are met. The shards must be placed first. Only when they are inactive again will he arrive.”

“Fine. No matter what form I take, I only need to be there when he returns.”

“Is revenge worth it?”

“It’s the only thing I’ve ever known. Leave me to my work, System. We’ll see how many plans these people have in place.”